I think the Alaskan brown bear hunt is one of those things all hunters place on a pedestal, and quite likely for good reason. I've hunted bruins a handful of times, but both of my near-attempts on browns have fallen through - once I swallowed the deposit because a shoulder injury (some of you old timers might recall I used to ride bulls for a living) a short time before my trip, and on my 2nd attempt, trying to add it to a caribou hunt, but the logistics didn't come together. The first time I went black bear hunting, I had this fantastical mystique in my head where it would be something completely different than any other hunting I had done. It was an amazing experience, but when you're talking about stand hunting (ambush), it's not so different than whitetail deer. If guys are familiar with spot and stalk hunting, whether western elk hunters or pronghorn chasers, it's a bit less of a paradigm shift. Doesn't take much physical condition to sit in a treestand a half mile off of the road - stalking is a completely different game.

The biggest advantage, for me, in hunting Alaska, despite the higher costs, for brown bear is the opportunity to use a handgun. Canada remains to be ran by a bunch of lilly livered sissies who don't allow handguns, so I'll cut off my nose to spite my face, spending more to hunt browns in Alaska instead of Canada.

Something can be said about how browns can be hunted, compared to Eastern bruins, which adds to some of that mystique about hunting them - besides the inherent danger in being so close to such a dangerous animal. Most of us are ambush hunters, whether it's stand hunting whitetails, calling coyotes, or turkey hunting, so many folks don't really have a concept of spot and stalk hunting techniques. When I went on my first elk hunt out of state - a nationally ranked high school wrestler at the time - it floored me how different it was. When I had an opportunity to take a nuisance black bear several years ago, I spoke with several outfitters at the time about how they're most effectively hunted in the west - which was like night and day to the ambush hunting I had done in Minnesota. Spot and stalk hunting is a different game, and when guys live their hunting life in states where properties are all privately owned, and all blocked out in 1x1mile sections, it's a very different paradigm. Equally different was the opportunity to tag along with guys running hounds for black bear in North Carolina - more similar to my experience hounding for coons, but obviously a much, much larger quarry!

I've done a quite a bit of fishing and hiking in Denali National Park, and I've convinced my wife several years ago to squirrel away two big sock drawers, one for a "family trip" to Africa when my son graduates HS, and the other for her and I to hunt Grizzly on the north face. It's more expensive in Alaska, but I'm a handgunner, so Canada is off of my list.

The Alaskan market is ideal for the hunting outfitter - the requirement to use a guide, and the (relatively real) risk of lower 48 folks becoming a statistic go hand in hand to keep them well paid. Folks will pay for the tags, so the tags will always cost that much.

I will also say this - having "poor man'd" my way to Alaska - if you have a desire to hunt bear in Alaska, either plan a few days/weeks in advance to spend doing other activities, or make a separate trip. The landscape is amazing, and frankly, it's a d@mned big state, so there's a lot of different landscape to see. My first trip up was on a fishing boat from Washington, where we didn't ever get more than a couple miles from shore, which was a completely different Alaska than what I saw when I went back on a trip visiting Denali National Park. There's a lot of Alaska to take in, and a few days spent focusing on a hunting trip can't do it justice.

Since Bruins aren't really "big bears," especially the runts I've taken, and the hunting really isn't so different in the East, I haven't found black bear to be significantly different than whitetails. Baiting is a hot topic, as are hounds, but for most guys going out of state, either of these also means a guided hunt, rather than DIY or drop-off.